Get Email Updates

The Dispatch E-Edition

All current subscribers have full access to Digital D, which includes the E-Edition and
unlimited premium content on Dispatch.com, BuckeyeXtra.com, BlueJacketsXtra.com and
DispatchPolitics.com.
Subscribe
today!

Enlarge ImageRequest to buy this photoAlex Brandon | Associated PressWashington Nationals baseball players from South America ask for an end to the Venezuelan violence. From left are Gabriel Alfaro, Wilson Ramos, Sandy Leon, Jose Lobaton and Jhonatan Solano at spring training in Kissimmee, Fla.

CARACAS, Venezuela — A meeting between a top Venezuelan opposition leader and President Nicolas
Maduro today may help ease nearly two weeks of violent anti-government protests that have killed at
least eight people.

State governor Henrique Capriles will meet Maduro at a routine gathering of governors and mayors
and likely will get a chance to present the opposition’s grievances.

The daily unrest has sharpened the bitter divide between critics and supporters of the ruling
Socialist Party, although even Maduro’s rivals appear to be growing weary of blocked streets and
constant clashes between students and police.

“Dialogue is not about listening to what the government wants to say, it’s about making sure the
demonstrators’ voices are heard,” Capriles, a two-time opposition presidential candidate, wrote
yesterday in his weekly column.

Five people have died of gunshot wounds in the unrest that began on Feb. 12 with the death of a
student protester and was later fueled by the arrest of hard-line opposition leader Leopoldo
Lopez.

A 23-year-old female student died on Saturday after being shot in the face with rubber bullets.
Others have died in accidents caused by the roadblocks.

Maduro, who has vowed to nurture the self-styled socialist revolution he inherited from the late
President Hugo Chavez, calls the demonstrations acts of terrorism by “fascists” seeking a coup
similar to the one that briefly ousted Chavez in 2002.